Hot Topics:

Presentation chronicles Boulder family's adventure in environmental field work

Teach your children

By Cindy Sutter Camera Staff Writer

Posted:
04/17/2013 12:37:56 PM MDT

Updated:
04/17/2013 12:48:38 PM MDT

In China, Hannah Isenhart helps her friend, BeiBei, shoot a picture of a stuffed panda for a greeting card that will be sold to help preserve pandas in the wild. (Courtesy photo Chip Isenhart)

Hannah and Jesse Isenhart present a contract for the water pipe that helped six families in Nepal and also preserved the forest around the local spring. (Courtesy photo Chip Isenhart)

If you go

What: Unplugging to Plug-In, a Family Adventure

When: 7 p.m. April 25

Where: Casey Middle School, 1301 High St., Boulder

How do you teach your children that they can make a difference in the world?

For Chip and Jill Isenhart, the answer was clear: Show and tell. The Boulder couple had already created a business, ECOS Communications around the show and tell model, developing educational materials and exhibits for conservation non-profits, wildlife groups, zoos and aquariums. As their two children Jesse, now 12, and Hannah, now 14, grew older, Chip and Jill wanted them to better understand their environmental work, as well as to see firsthand the threats to wildlife and their habitats.

What they had in mind was to contact various environmental groups who could use their expertise and offer their services in exchange for room and board for the entire family. They planned a six-month trip to three diverse places: Kenya, Nepal and China. The family will offer a presentation on their trip, "Unplugging to Plug-In, a Family Adventure," at Casey Middle School on April 25.

Getting ready

Jesse and Hannah reacted to the prospect of the trip just as most kids their age might. "Our son, who loves to travel, was beaming from ear to ear," Chip says. "Our daughter, who was in the eighth grade, looked at us and said, 'I can't leave my friends.'"

Advertisement

The kids were not naifs when it comes to experiencing life in other countries, however. When Hannah and Jesse were younger, the Isenharts lived for a year in Panama while the parents worked for the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. Since then, the kids have spent an extended spring break in Panama every year, going to school and keeping their Spanish fresh.

When they discussed the potential trip, Jill asked Hannah: "Can you imagine if you never went to Panama?"

That turned the tide. The trip came together quickly. In about three weeks, the Isenbergs had their house rented (to parents), and they had winnowed down the groups that were interested in their help.

"When we were on Skype and trading e-mails, we were really trying to envision how the kids could plug in to the project," Chip says. "What would the kids be doing? Could they go to school locally? With research at the reserves, could they help out?"

Family adventure

In Kenya, they went to the Ol Pejeta Conservancy, which blends tourism and conservation and the Daraja Academy, a secondary school, where underprivileged girls from all over the country attend. In China, they worked with The Nature Conservancy on education and visitor experience for the country's first private nature reserve. In Nepal, they worked on teaching and interpretive training in the towns of Khandbari and Dhupu.

At the Ol Pejeta Conservancy, Hannah and Jesse were able to observe wildlife, including lions, close up.

"That was scary," Jesse says. "It was really cool to see them growl and interact."

They also helped with tasks such as collecting animal pooh so researchers could check for diseases. At the Daraja Academy, Hannah connected with the girls, who had worked incredibly hard to be able to have the opportunity to go to school.

"The girls cared so much," she says. "They were so excited to have the privilege. It was a way to get out of their hard life."

Learning and helping

After finishing school, however, many of the girls faced an additional challenge -- a one year gap between graduation and college acceptance. Often, if they returned to their home villages, their impoverished families would have arranged for them to marry.

Hannah and Jesse suggested connecting the conservancy and the school, which led to the creation of a program at the conservancy to allow Daraja graduates to train in environmental education as field guides.

For both kids, going to Daraja left them with an appreciation for their own schools and how easy it is to get an education here.

Hannah says she realized how hard her teachers worked to make various subjects interesting.

"I was mad that kids didn't realize that and respect it," she says. "I was like, 'Don't you know people are struggling and would die for this opportunity?'"

As a seventh-grader, Hannah started her own business called, "Hanimals," in which she photographed stuffed animals such as grizzly bears in the habitat where real grizzlies roam. She made the images into greeting cards and calendars and sold them at several local stores, giving the proceeds to Polar Bear International.

In China, she explained the business to BeiBei, the daughter of their Chinese translator, who started a similar business using stuffed pandas.

For Chip and Jill, having the kids on the trip came with a bonus beyond their companionship -- it broke down barriers.

"We had no idea how much having them in a tow (made us) immediately welcome everywhere," Jill says. "We were not introduced as consultants, we were introduced as a family -- here's the work this family will be doing. A lot of people had families of their own. It gave us sort of a common ground."

In Nepal, their host family had no electricity or running water. Hannah says toting the water back from the spring, a 20-minute walk away was hard work.

"It was actually pretty difficult. It hurt your back and neck. Water would spill on you," she says.

There, the family helped set up a project that piped water from the spring to six families who needed it. The project cost $300, a third of which was contributed by Jesse and Hannah.

"I was just amazed. I realized if I cut down on some privileges like not going out to dinner and saved that money ... I could help other people (change their lives)," Hannah says.

Boulder is pretty good at producing rock bands, and by "rock," we mean the in-your-face, guitar-heavy, leather-clad variety — you know, the good kind. For a prime example, look no farther than BANDITS. Full Story